Oscars selfie from Ellen DeGeneres sets a new Twitter world record

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Proving just how much TV viewing habits have changed, viewers of last night's Oscars have helped TV star and comedian Ellen DeGeneres break a record.

Host of the 86th Academy Awards DeGeneres crammed in a host of A-listers into a selfie photographed by American Hustle star Bradley Cooper, and broke a new record - with the help of millions of Twitter users worldwide.

As of 15.00 GMT, the message on the micro blogging social network had gained over 2.6 million retweets. The informal snap, featuring a huddle of Hollywood stars including Brad Pitt, Julia Roberts and Meryl Streep, smashed the previous record for most re-tweeted message on Twitter.

The record had previously been held by a message from Barack Obama to his followers on Twitter, shortly after his re-election as US President in November 2012. That message, which read simply "Four more years" and included a photo of the President hugging his wife Michelle, was tweeted from Mr Obama's account at 04:16 GMT on 7 November 2012.

Just nine hours later, it had been re-tweeted more than half a million times by other users of the social networking site.

Ellen also holds the record for most followers on Twitter for a TV personality with 26,708,297 followers as of today (3rd March 2014) - and rising fast according to this blog from Twitter.